Given the media hype regarding all forms of human trauma, the secret of deregistration may seem counter-intuitive.
However, when you turn your attention away from your television set and look at the scientific research, the myths about sex offending are quickly dispelled. Does a sex offender have a greater chance of reoffending with a new sex offense as compared to the chance of a non-sex offender reoffending with a non-sex offense? To answer this question, you have to come up with two numbers: the percentage of sex offenders released from prison who commit a new sex offense and percentage of non-sex offenders released from prison who commit a new non-sex offense.
Do you have those two numbers in mind? Most approaches employ a number of treatments. The majority include two components: cognitive-behavior therapy, which aims to change sexually deviant thoughts, behaviors and arousal patterns, and relapse prevention, which aims to teach sex offenders how to anticipate and cope with problems such as feelings of anger or loneliness that can lead to reoffending.
Although the development of treatments for sex offenders is still in its infancy, studies show that therapy can make a difference. Sex offenders are not all fated to repeat their horrible crimes, and we—through the actions of the general public, policy leaders and legislators—can encourage hope by supporting further research on such therapies.
Already a subscriber? Sign in. Thanks for reading Scientific American. Create your free account or Sign in to continue. See Subscription Options. Go Paperless with Digital. Repeat Offenders First, the notion that recidivism repeat offending is inevitable needs a second look. Get smart. Sign up for our email newsletter. Sign Up. Support science journalism. In fact, a careful review of the scientific and legal literature shows that determining true recidivism rates are next to impossible as recidivism rates only count the number of sex offenders released into the community who are caught and convicted.
The vast majority of sex offenses are never reported. For instance, the National Women's Study surveyed a representative sample of over 4, adult women in the United States. Three hundred forty-one 8. And it must be remembered, of the few offenses reported, an even smaller number result in convictions.
The problem with using recidivism rates to determine the rate of reoffending is readily apparent when considering the following example. Prentky et al. Likewise, a review by the American Psychological Association concluded that "the research demonstrates that even sexual offenses against children that occurred long ago evince a continuing risk of recidivism by the offender. Another perspective on the problem is offered by Anna Salter, one of the foremost experts on sex offenders in the country.
Survival analysis computes standard error of estimate based on the number of recidivists and non-recidivists available at each previous time interval. For example, looking at Appendix II, the five year estimate for the overall sample With large sample sizes, the confidence intervals are narrow, indicating that subsequent research is likely to find very similar results.
Readers should note, however, that confidence intervals expanded with extended follow-up times and when subgroups of offenders were examined. For example, the 15 year estimate for boy-victim child molesters The recidivism estimates may be applied to the general case or to the individual offender. For example, if you were faced with a group of newly released rapists and you wanted to follow these offenders in the community over time Looking at Table 2 - Second sub-group - "Rapists" you would expect fourteen 14 of these rapists to reoffend within the first 5 years.
In the following 5 years, follow-up years 6 through 10, you would expect a further 7 rapists to reoffend for a total of 21 offenders failing after 10 years. You may also estimate the recidivism probabilities of one offender over time.
The probability of recidivism for an individual offender will be the same as the observed recidivism rate for the group to which he most closely belongs. The individual's recidivism risk will differ from his group's recidivism rate to the extent that the offender differs from "typical" members of the group e.
It is important to remember that the confidence intervals for the recidivism estimates only apply to the group estimates and not to the individual estimates. In statistical language, the expected mean value for the individual is the same as the group mean, but the variance of the mean is much greater for the individual estimate than for the group estimate.
Most sexual offenders do not re-offend sexually over time. This may be the most important finding of this study as this finding is contrary to some strongly held beliefs. The sample was sufficiently large that very strong contradictory evidence is necessary to substantially change these recidivism estimates.
Other studies have found similar results. In a recent U. Not all sexual offenders, however, were equally likely to reoffend. The factors associated with increased risk were the following: a male victims, b prior sexual offences, and c young age.
Although the number of recidivists increases with extended follow-up, the rate of offending decreases the longer offenders have been offence-free. The observed rates underestimate the actual rates because not all sexual offences are detected; nevertheless, the current findings contrast with the popular notion that all sexual offender remain at risk throughout their lifespan.
Doren's estimates were largely based on long-term follow-up of highly selected samples Hanson et al. Doren's estimates were also based on charges, whereas most of the recidivism data in the current study was based on convictions. Another difference is that Doren attempted to generate life-time estimates whereas our estimates extend only to 15 years. We were unable to locate any study that followed a large sample of sexual offenders until they were dead.
Nevertheless, the decreasing rate of offending with age suggests that the rates observed after 15 to 20 years are likely to approximate the rates that would be observed if offenders were followed for the rest of their lives.
When people ask questions about sexual offender recidivism rates, there often is an inherent assumption that the answer is a fixed, knowable rate that will not change. This supposition is unlikely to be true. The rate of sexual re-offence is quite likely to change over time due to social factors and the effectiveness of strategies for managing this population.
Most of the offenders in the current study did not receive effective treatment, whereas treatment is currently provided to almost all of the high risk sexual offenders in Canada. Furthermore, increased public awareness and concern should reduce the opportunities for sexual offenders to locate potential victims. Although no finding is ever definitive, the basic findings of the current study are sufficiently reliable to have implications for criminal justice policy.
Given that the level of sexual recidivism is lower than commonly believed, discussions of the risk posed by sexual offenders should clearly differentiate between the high public concern about these offences and the relatively low probability of sexual re-offence.
The variation in recidivism rates suggests that not all sex offenders should be treated the same. The greater the assessed risk, the higher the levels of intervention and supervision; the lower the assessed risk, the lower the levels of intervention and supervision.
Consequently, blanket policies that treat all sexual offenders as "high risk" waste resources by over-supervising lower risk offenders and risk diverting resources from the truly high-risk offenders who could benefit from increased supervision and human service.
Although the broad risk markers in the current study are useful for estimating recidivism risk, it is possible to improve predictive accuracy by combining such factors into structured risk scales e. The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada.
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Andrews, D. The psychology of criminal conduct, Third Edition. Cincinnati, Ohio: Anderson Publishing. Barbaree, H. Evaluating the predictive accuracy of six risk assessment instruments for adult sex offenders. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 28, Berliner, L. A sentencing alternative for sex offenders: A study of decision making and recidivism.
Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 10, Besserer, S. Criminal victimization in Canada, Catalogue no. Ottawa: Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics. Bonta, J. Unpublished raw data. Violent recidivism of men released from prison. An evaluation of community sex offender programs in the Pacific Region. Vancouver, B.
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